If Savard was playing forward on the PK, then his PK statistics shouldn't be compared to Robinson's should they?
Not sure you want to go down that route. If you consider Savard a forward for pk stats purposes, he would be the 4th most prolific PK forward of all-time, and very nearly Ramsay's equal. Robinson's PK stats, while very good, are rather underwhelming for a player of his stature - his 45% usage figure is 93rd among defensemen with 600+ games. Ramsey fares a little better (49%, 59th) but there should be little doubt that Johnson outranks them both, as does Seibert, whose scary size and mobility match those of Robinson and who was perhaps the best defender of his era. Similarly, Walker trumps Gilmour, but looking at the two sets of players, we've managed to match you on the PK, and ours won't be going up against a scary Lafleur-like threat.
What's interesting about Savard vs. Keith? Keith is very clearly the better player.
So Keith finally puts together a deep enough resume to get taken within 5 spots of Savard the last two years, and suddenly he's "very clearly the better player"? If we go strictly by award voting, sure, but Savard is a very unique player for whom award voting really doesn't tell the story, and the fact that we still ranked him where we did in the HOH defense project after taking a sharp knife to him and other comparables speaks to that.
The consensus on Keith is that he's clearly passed Niedermayer. I'm on board with that for sure. I could be convinced on Keith over Savard too, at this moment. But "very clearly the better player" reeks of partisanship.
(if award voting is truly that important at the expense of competition factors and team situation, then we should take a good look at Robinson vs. Seibert
)
Vadnais put up lesser offensive numbers than Larsson while also seeing a spike when he played with Orr. Could you say he sucked less defensively that Larsson? Maybe. They were both bad. What they bring to the table is offense, and Larsson brings more.
- Vadnais' numbers were only in the 4% range lower than Larson's, and that's if we don't count 1969. If we do count 1969, and remove the 6 points he scored as a forward (as it appears is the case) then they are even. Certainly if you look at the raw totals it looks like Larson outscored him a lot, but the higher scoring 80s (as well as the general trend towards higher scoring defensemen) contributed to that. Relative to other top scoring defensemen in their eras, they were equals offensively.
- Vadnais'
totals saw a spike with Orr, but defensemen as a whole were getting more involved in the offense, and he was not really any more dominant among the top defensemen than he already had been in 1969, 1970 and 1972. Also, he only played with Orr on the PP, and was still the 5th-highest scoring defenseman in the league at ES both seasons (he'd have a 95 and 92 ES VsXD score those seasons, if I had calculated such a statistic).
- Can I say he sucked less defensively? Yes, I can say he sucked a lot less. Larson is really quite rare a player when you read those scouting reports. On an annual basis they have to say something about how his defense needs work or how he's working on improving it. It was clearly a weak point for him. As for Vadnais, check his bio, I left nothing out. There are definitely hints here and there, but then there are guys providing counterpoints to that way of thinking as well. He was a two-way player and all-around minute muncher that was just a step below the real elites and was more valuable offensively than defensively, but that's not the same thing as Larson. I call Vadnais an "offenseman" here in the ATD, but Larson was an "offenseman" even at the NHL level.
- Vadnais' best seasons for all-star recognition are better than Larson's across the board: 6, 7, 9, 9, 10 vs 10, 10, 12, 14.
- During Vadnais' 8-year prime, he played an estimated 27.3 minutes a game for teams 13% better than average. Larson played a very similar amount (26.7 minutes, which is about the same considering the slight era differences), but for teams 14% worse than average.
- There is lots of information calling Vadnais physical and tough. Was Larson? He had good size, got into a decent amount of fights and had some PIM, but was he a Vadnais-level presence? I am asking because I honestly don't know. It's strangely never mentioned in the scouting reports you quoted, and I'm not sure what that means; it could just be overshadowed by his offense and his defensive struggles.
- Yes, Vadnais is just a better Reed Larson.
Hall has quickly become over-rated. I'm glad BB took the time to put together a detailed bio for him, but I think the real information kind of gets buried within it. If there's a lot of information on his defensive game in there, I miss it every time I read through the bio.
Overrated? As long as Joe Hall gets selected around pick #300, placed on 3rd pairings and has people like jarek suggesting he is not as good defensively as Harry Cameron, he's anything but overrated. He got canonized early on in these things as well below Cameron and Ross (to name two), without much of a real reason backing that, and now that there's a legitimate resistance mounted to that, I expect it to be an uphill battle.
But hey, I hear ya. I wish it was more detailed too. But let me ask you this - Moose Johnson aside, can you show me what a bio for a Joe Hall-era defenseman that clearly proves he was elite defensively looks like?
The star power is there. The plaudits of him as an overall player are there. The team results are above average. Very little, if anything, suggests otherwise. And hey, I'm not making any bold proclamation here - only that he's better than Mike Ramsey. The 4th-7th best defenseman of the era should be better than the 13th-17th of the 80s, right?
Yes there is very little honestly about Hall's defensive game. I think Harry Cameron is better than him defensively, and only because Cameron's defensive game is a lot more fleshed out.
My read on Hall is that he became famous strictly due to his nastiness and his offensive abilities. I doubt he was anything spectacular defensively.
- this again, jarek? look, no one used the word "spectacular" here except you.
You think Harry Cameron's defensive game is more fleshed out. That's great that his newspapers reported in more detail and had more material to search, but you yourself found plenty of examples of questionable and/or inconsistent and/or bad defensive play by Cameron that you put in your bio. having read the entire thing again, this is clearly the profile of an "offenseman". Let me remind you again about the defensive results both players attained:
Over the 7 years they were in the league together (plus the year before and after), Hall's teams allowed, on average, 98.5% of the goals against average of the league. Cameron's allowed 106.8% of the average.
I realize that one defenseman is typically only 1/3 of what it takes to stop most goals. But Cameron had better goalies, typically, as well. Holmes in Toronto, then Benedict, Vezina and Roach in the NHL. Hall had Paddy Moran, a slightly lesser light, throughout his NHA days before finally getting Vezina for two NHL seasons.
One more interesting thing to note - in two seasons where Cameron spent time with two teams, the results are striking.
1919:
Ottawa goes from 3.9 GAA with Cameron, to 1.8 without him.
Totonto goes from 4.9 GAA without Cameron, to 5.4 with him.
1920:
Toronto goes from 5.2 GAA with Cameron, to 3.7 without him.
Montreal goes from 4.3 GAA without Cameron, to 5.2 with him.
These numbers include a few games Cameron didn't play in, but I don't know which ones those were. I would revisit if I knew. but over two seasons, teams that traded and acquired Cameron allowed 4.9 goals a game with him, and 3.7 without.
I don't have the ability to do this for Hall, because he was never traded midseason like Cameron was, so assessing his impact when arriving or departing a team can't be done, but it is clear that his teams tended to have about 8% better defensive results.
Also, Iain Fyffe's player contribution is not the gospel but it's one useful way to assess value delivered by players, and Cameron and Hall are very close there, and we know Cameron had much greater offensive value so for them to be even close, Hall had to be given a lot more points for his team's defensive performance - and he clearly was.
in your reply, you mentioned that
It should be noted that in my game report research, 1919 and 1920 had the fewest instances of poor defensive play from Cameron, so I have a difficult time attributing all of this to him. the fact that there were so many such mentions that you were able to single out seasons that had the "fewest" should tell you all you need to know.
BenchBrawl can speak for himself, but I am 90% sure he creates his bios like me and doesn't leave anything out. If what we have here is a complete picture of what has been uncovered about both players, I think it's highly unreasonable to put Cameron above Hall defensively.
I see the word "wide" as so subjective! We could perfectly agree on the quantitative difference but disagree on what word to describe it. For the record, I'd say Roy over Brodeur is wide, and any post I've ever made comparing the two will confirm that is indeed my stance
